Orascom Telecom awards Alcatel-Lucent
—The Mediterranean Sea segment of Middle East North Africa (MENA) submarine cable network
By Asghar Ali Mubarak

 

MENA to position Egypt as central hub for traffic transit across Europe, Middle East and Asia

ISLAMABAD— World's largest  renowned solution provider company The Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU) has signed a turnkey contract with Orascom Telecom to lay the Mediterranean Sea segment of a new 3,850 km submarine cable network, named Middle East North Africa (MENA). Positioning Egypt as a central hub for traffic transit across Europe, Middle East and Asia, the new submarine network will provide an added-value vehicle to support the increased broadband communications in the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea.
MENA will link Egypt, Italy and Saudi Arabia, delivering an ultimate capacity of 5.76 Tbit/s that will greatly increase international and regional connectivity. With completion scheduled by the first quarter of 2009, it will allow businesses and consumers to benefit from enhanced capacity and reliability to access innovative broadband services. Alcatel-Lucent will be responsible for the turnkey rollout of the Egypt to Italy segment that will have landing points in Alexandria (Egypt) and Mazara del Vallo, Sicily, in Italy.
“MENA will enable improved international connectivity to support new, high-speed services and brings us an important step closer to delivering the much needed international bandwidth services to the Middle East and Asia through Orascom Telecom’s several companies around the world,” said Naguib Sawiris, CEO and Chairman of Orascom Telecom.
“With today’s market changes, operators have to address increased connectivity requirements, while minimizing their operational costs and guaranteeing performance continuity at the highest level possible,” said Olivier Picard, President of Alcatel-Lucent’s Europe and South activities. “Our cost-effective solutions enable our customers to enhance their network efficiency for strengthened end-user satisfaction with easy-to-operate services and applications.”
The Alcatel-Lucent submarine solution will be based on its 1620 Light Manager next-generation DWDM submarine platform, and will also include cable and submarine repeaters and branching units, providing direct connectivity to landing stations. A comprehensive suite of professional services, including permitting and project management, engineering, marine operation, and installation testing and commissioning, is part of this turnkey project.
This new project further strengthens the long-lasting cooperation between Alcatel-Lucent and Orascom Telecom, who have successfully partnered on the implementation of several fixed and wireless communications projects in different countries around the world.

 

About Orascom Telecom Orascom Telecom is a leading international telecommunications company operating GSM networks in seven high growth markets in the Middle East, Africa and South Asia, having a total population under license of approximately 460 million with an average mobile telephony penetration of approximately 33% as at 30th June 2007. Orascom Telecom operates GSM networks in Algeria ("OTA"), Pakistan ("Mobilink"), Egypt ("Mobinil"), Tunisia ("Tunisiana"), Iraq ("Iraqna"), Bangladesh ("Banglalink"), and Zimbabwe ("Telecel Zimbabwe"). Orascom Telecom had over 61 million subscribers as at June 2007. Orascom Telecom owns 19.3% of Hutchison Telecommunications International Limited, a leading telecommunication services provider operating in seven countries. Orascom Telecom is traded on the Cairo & Alexandria Stock Exchange under the symbol (ORTE.CA, ORAT EY), and on the London Stock Exchange its GDR is traded under the symbol (ORTEq.L, OTLD LI).

About Alcatel-Lucent Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU) provides solutions that enable service providers, enterprises and governments worldwide, to deliver voice, data and video communication services to end-users. As a leader in fixed, mobile and converged broadband networking, IP technologies, applications, and services, Alcatel-Lucent offers the end-to-end solutions that enable compelling communications services for people at home, at work and on the move. With operations in more than 130 countries, Alcatel-Lucent is a local partner with global reach. The company has the most experienced global services team in the industry, and one of the largest research, technology and innovation organizations in the telecommunications industry. Alcatel-Lucent achieved adjusted proforma revenues of Euro 18.3 billion in 2006 and is incorporated in France, with executive offices located in Paris.